Brenna’s quilt

Remember the quilt Brenna and I were working on? It’s done! Instead of basting and free motion quilting it myself I decided to go with plan B. I sent the finished quilt top and back fabric to my mom who lives near the best quilt store I’ve ever been to. She can rent time on their long arm quilting machines and the work she does is always amazing. This one is no exception. Brenna LOVES it!

My mom even bound it too. It’s a truly 3 generation project, the 48 blocks pieced by Brenna, everything squared up and sewn together by me, and then finished to perfection by my mom. What a treasure.

Here’s a shot of the back:

The girl room is coming together. I think we can fit another one in there. During Barry’s long June the loft bed got built.

We’re getting there. About a month to go. The hot days go by so slowly, but the weeks are whizzing by.

summer, crazy summer

So, I’ve been pretty neglectful of this space. Barry had most of June off as he wound down from one assignment and prepared to start a command position this past week. That was such a wonderful break– I never got a chance to make dinner (bummer), only had to deal with half of the poopy diapers, and had time to work on designing a new sewing pattern! It also meant that I had a hard time figuring out my routine and how to have my own computer time. Hopefully for the next week or so I’ll have a bit of a normal routine, but then on to swimming lessons and then a new baby…

But, do you want to see what we did today?

We went to the reservoir with friends with boats. Why is it that every time we get to go boating I can’t water ski because I’m pregnant? I guess since I’ve been pregnant for something like 12 years straight (or at least it feels that way). It was still fun– my little Hunter just snuggled up as close as he could to me and fell asleep to the hum of the motor, the fresh air, and sunshine.

AND we went to Yellowstone

When we were planning our trip we thought we’d try to go camping, but eastern Idaho weather is a bit tricky. We decided we’d just play it by ear and see what we thought as the dates got closer. Rain. Wind. COLD nights. We decided that camping wouldn’t be very fun. We wanted to see Yellowstone anyway, so we made it a day trip. It was a lot of driving in one day, but I think the memories were worth it.

There were bison, bison, bison for my cute nephews to spy with their new binoculars.

Seriously, could little boys be any cuter (other than mine, of course)?

My favorite area was the Lower Geyser Basin area with the mud pots, colorful pools, and lots of little active geysers.

The only other time I’ve been to Yellowstone was on our first wedding anniversary. We decided to ride the main loop on our bikes– which was about 100 miles– which didn’t really give us any time to actually see anything but the backs of RVs. This time was good from the comfort of our van and since it was early in the season it wasn’t very crowded.

We made the obligatory stop to watch Old Faithful. There was quite a crowd and I was prepared for it to be pretty anticlimactic, but it was actually really cool!

I can’t imagine what the Native Americans thought about this place– was it holy? was it cursed? That’s something we should research…

We drove all through the park and made our way toward Grand Teton National Park.

Look what we found once we got past Old Faithful:

About 5 feet of snow. I’m glad we didn’t try to camp.

It was the perfect time of year for the drive though. The Tetons were breathtaking. Not a single picture we took can really do them justice. It’s hard to get the metering right. Just imagine the bluest sky you’ve ever seen and dark mountains highlighted with white snow.

We listened to Fablehaven by Brandon Mull (and we really love this series) for the drive from Colorado to Idaho and part of this Yellowstone trip and also to Igraine the Brave by Cornelia Funke. Road trips are made so much better with good books to listen to. Much better than movies, I think, because one story can take 10 hours, fill everyone’s imaginations for the long haul, and even make it so the kids don’t want to get out of the car just quite yet when we get where we’re going.

our exotic vacation to the potato capital of the world

I’m an Idaho girl born and raised– but I didn’t grow up in potato growing Idaho. In fact, I don’t think I really saw a potato field until I was a teenager. I grew up in Boise, which is about as citified as Idaho can get. (And really one of the coolest cities there is, in my humble opinion. The Denver area, where we live now, is pretty cool, but way too big for me. Boise is like a mini Denver.)

My brother, however, married a girl from the potato capital of the world and lives there now. We decided to make this year’s Idaho trip to their neck of the woods. No matter where you go, if you’re with family it’s the perfect place. We had fun.

My brother and his family spent the winter making this little house, built in something like 1913, livable. For $19,000 they got some good bones, but had to totally gut it. The before pictures are pretty scary. It amazes me how some people choose to live. The plaster had completely fallen off the walls in some places so you could see right outside through the walls. My brother and his wife didn’t realize that the black sink was really bright orange enamel until they did a little cleaning before the kitchen demolition. My brother’s done an amazing job turning it into a lovely home for his family. They’ve just got to build a garage and put siding on and they can say it’s done.

My parents came out too and brought one of my little nieces.

The kids played outside every second they could.

We got there just in time to see a baby gecko hatch!

We went swimming at Lava Hot Springs,

played with Papa at the park,

and celebrated his birthday.

Did you know that there is an entire museum dedicated to the Idaho potato?

Well, now you do. One thing I learned is that potatoes are native to South America. They were brought to Europe by Spanish explorers, spread throughout Europe, and then were later brought to North America. So even though Idaho is so uniquely suited to potato growing they’re not from there. I never knew that.

More importantly, though, the museum houses the largest collection of potato mashers (neatly displayed thanks to some kid’s Eagle Scout project) and the world’s largest Pringle (technically a potato “crisp”).

There was also some prep for the front walk to be done, so all the boys pitched in to help.

Little kids sure love to do REAL work.

It kept them busy for a long time.

I sure love my family and it was so good to visit Tyler and Katie and their cute boys. Cramming 7 extra people (or 10!) into a little house with one bathroom can be a little crazy– but it was good crazy. And too short.

(We did venture farther than the Potato Museum– that’s where we saw the bison I posted the other day. It will take a whole other post to show you that, so come back tomorrow.)